Power Lunch - The Future of Stablecoins 7/18/225

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

CNBC’s Tyler Mathisen and Kelly Evans take you through the heart of the business day bringing you the latest developments and instant analysis on the stocks and stories driving the day’s agenda. “Power Lunch” delves into the economy, markets, politics, real estate, media, technology and more. The show sits at the intersection of power and money. “Power Lunch” gives viewers a full plate of CNBC’s award-winning business news coverage, plus a healthy dose of personality from the show’s anchors and the network’s top-notch roster of reporters and digital journalists. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

And welcome to Power Lunch alongside Kelly Evans, who you just saw. I'm Brian Sullivan. New it too. The market wasn't session lows. It may now be about ready to turn higher, Kelly. I think I speak for everybody when I say, you're welcome, America. Well, we had some new news on the trade front trying to digest that as always. Plus the future of digital currencies just got some more clarity. Landmarked legislation passing in the House heading to the president's desk. We'll have more on that in a minute. Yeah, we got some big legal news in oil and gas.

Chevron has won a major court case against Exxon Mobile and arbitration panel in Paris, ruled that Exxon does not have the right to try to buy Hess's big stake in a Guyana oil field. That ruling now allowing Chevron to buy out Hess Oil, Hess and Chevron. Well, Chevron was higher. Chevron's now down. Exxon is down. Hess is higher. And by the way, another major player in the energy space,

SLB. It is down following earnings. The CEO of that company, Olivier Le Pusch, will join us for a live exclusive interview, his first, Kelly, interview of 2025. Looking forward to that. Let's begin with those new reports on the tariff front. Megan Kassela has the latest. And Megan, the president talking about 15 to 20 percent blanket tariffs on the EU. Is that right? That's absolutely right, Kelly. That's coming from the Financial Times reporting that the president is holding firm with Brussels, asking for that tariff to be at a minimum, as you said, of 15 to 20 percent. That's on everything coming in from the EU as part of any deal that he strikes with Brussels. Now, that's according to three people briefed on the discussions to the F.T.

And it comes after the EU's lead trade negotiator, Maro Scefkovic, returned to Brussels today to brief EU diplomats after he was just in Washington this week for trade talks with some U.S. officials. So now, that is technically a downgrade from Trump's current threats against the EU. If you guys will remember last week's letter from the president called for a 30% tariff on EU import. So it's a step down in one regard, but it does show that even if the two sides do strike a deal, there is going to be some significant level of tariff likely remaining in place. And that, of course, would match the pattern that we have seen in these early framework deals struck so far with the UK, Indonesia, Vietnam,

still waiting on more details on most of them, but they've all maintained tariffs of between 10 and 20%. Then the FT also did report, and I can confirm this part, the president is not likely to lower the 25% sectoral tariff on cars and car parts for Brussels. That's something the EU had hoped to see as part of this deal. And just a reminder, guys, the president has had quite strong words publicly for the EU in recent weeks, calling them brutal and tougher than China when it comes to trade. He said earlier this week he could possibly make a deal with Brussels and that for now, now that they want a deal, they're, quote, being very nice. Guys, he had said 30% in the recent weeks, right? This would be kind of lower than that, but still a blanket tariff. So I don't know.

That's exactly. That's exactly right. It's almost a mixed bag. As of April 2nd, the tariff on the EU was going to be 20%. That's, of course, been paused. Then as of the letter in the last week or so, it was going to be 30%. So that was an escalation, and he's really said he isn't seeing what he wants to see from Brussels. So the reporting now that the minimum would be 15 to 20%.

It's not surprising because we do believe that even as part of these deals, some level of tariff is going to remain. But because the EU as a block is our largest trading partner, it is still really significant, even if it's technically down from his last threat. All right. Megan, thanks. Megan Kassello. We appreciate it. And another headline from D.C., the president, to sign the first major crypto bill known as the Genius Act into law within the hour,

creating a regulatory framework for stable coins that could totally reshape the financial industry. Whether that means broader approval of crypto bank charters or widespread adoption of stable coins in crypto across multiple. multiple industries. Coinbase, Robin Hood, and Circle are clear winners here. Coin at a record high, circle lower, but the stock is up 600% from its IPO just a few weeks ago. Our next guest operates one of the biggest crypto exchanges in the world and is at the White House for the ceremony. Joining us now is Dave Ripley. He's the co-CEO of Cracken. Dave, what's the significance of this day for you? Welcome.

Yeah, well, thanks for having me. So, you know, this is a historic day. Long time coming. It's been a long journey. You know, I first started coming out to D.C. many years ago, talking about the regulatory environment, talking about a day like today where we would actually have some clarity. And it's frankly a testament to individuals like Senator Haggerty, who I first met many years ago and who led the Genius Act and pulling this over the table and bringing it to the president's desk. And frankly, also a testament to the administration who's erasing the errors of the past in the previous administration. and really moving us to a place where the U.S. is now embracing innovation. But does it make you nervous or do you kind of go, I know what's coming when Charles Schwab was on our air earlier today saying, yeah, you know, we'd probably launch, you know, crypto trading on our platform.

Yeah. Well, this is actually from our standpoint, me personally, one of the biggest benefits of this. This brings about more clarity. So now we can have many more businesses that previously, were uncertain, unsure about what the regulatory environment was to move into the cryptocurrency industry. I've actually personally met with nearly every executive team of all of the traditional financial services firms, all the big banks, all the big brokers. They have teams that are getting ready to bring crypto to their customers. As far as Cracking goes, we're going

to be part of that story. We'll be providing products, infrastructure to help power those various companies to bring crypto to their customers. the audience understand, and by audience, I also mean me, understand the significance of this bill. I understand what a stable coin is. I understand what this bill does, but there's a part of me that doesn't understand why people can't just put good old-fashioned cash or short-term T-bills or whatever it might be and sort of replace the stable coin. Why is this bill so meaningful to your industry? Well, you know, I think the key piece here is that. is the following. So cryptocurrency is a fantastic new innovation. It allows for faster, cheaper, more

secure, better payment system. People are already using cryptocurrency around the globe to achieve that end. The adoption is fantastic. I mean, we're growing at multiples every year with adoption of cryptocurrency for payments. This brings cryptocurrency and the U.S. dollar together to where the U.S. dollar can now kind of ride on those rails of the better, faster, cheaper payments. And we can now bring the U.S. dollar to more and more global payments around the world. So I think it's a huge win for the crypto industry and a huge win, frankly, for the U.S. dollar and for the United States. Why is it a win for the U.S. dollar? Just some other reason to purchase the dollar vis-a-vis the stable coin? So the stable coins now are basically a way to hold and send dollars in a much

faster, more global way at lower cost. We can now move, frankly, millions, tens of millions, hundreds of millions across the globe for virtually zero cost with the stable coin. Now that we have this structure with the stable coin bill, we can do that in a very clean, clear way that's under a regulatory framework. And so it's a huge win for adoption of the dollar across the United States and across the globe importantly. So let me just... How old are you? Can I ask roughly how old you are, Dave? I'm asking for a reason, not because I'm trying to get first. So that was how old I was? Yes. How old you are? So 48. Okay. Do you remember what a video game arcade was? That's why I'm asking. I did. I grew up going to the video arcade after the... Yes. Same as me. Played Gondlet and rollerball and all these things. Fantastic.

I'm asking for a reason because it sounds like the stable coin here is in a very, very more sophisticated way. kind of becoming the arcade token. Remember that? You put the money in and you get the tokens out and the tokens would be used to play all the video games. It was a way to kind of ease the currency backlog or jam, whatever, at the arcade.

In a very basic way, is that what this is doing for the US dollar and crypto? You know, I think the analogy mostly works. I don't think there's like a drastic difference. You know, for what it's worth, in the arcade, you know, those tokens can only be used.

used within the arcade. But when you actually create a stable coin, they can be used in many more places. Effectively, anywhere individuals accept the dollar, they might want to accept a stable coin, US dollar stable coin. So I think that's kind of the key difference is that we actually see the stable coins being accepted many different businesses, many different individuals already used for peer-to-peer payments. And I think that's kind of the key distinction here. Well, you rolled with it great. It was the best I could do on a Friday. It's been a long week. Dave Ripley, Crackett, thank you very much, putting it in plain English. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So now let's kind of broaden this out. Talk more about crypto. Talk more about the markets. One of our favorite guests, Jan Vannack, CEO of Vannick

Associates. I don't know if the arcade thing worked. It was the best I could do, Jan. Good to have you on. As an asset manager yourself, yeah. Do you read this bill as a way to broadly expand the industry? and one day that, if it hasn't already, is going to affect VanX clients. It's affecting a lot of parts of the market. If you just look at what's happened this week so far, we started off with bank earnings. It's earnings season. And the bank CEOs, what are they talking about? They're talking about bringing out stable coins.

So you don't really need to know what a stable coin is. I agree that, you know, but it can be behind the scenes, but it will be affecting all the brand name companies that are part of the indices. So not just banks, but you see Uber talking. about using stable coins. They're going to use it to lower costs because right now the credit card system, which is what a lot of people use, is expensive for people. So this is like the running theme of it. Remember when Drew Mattis yesterday talked about how the 3% surcharge fees aren't included in CPI and how Matt everyone's getting and everyone's using cash? The argument many are making for stable coins is that they'll disintermediate so you

don't have to pay the 3% to visa, whether you're the merchant or the consumer. I sort of feel like people are going to get their money somehow. One way, do you know what I'm saying? I don't know exactly how that all shakes out, but I'd love to think, oh, yeah, just use stable coins. You don't have to pay the 3%. But I'm like, they're going to figure out it away. Well, look, there's some embedded cost in the system, right? Fraud is one of them. And it doesn't matter what technologies.

If there's money there, fraudsters will try to find it. And that's one of the big costs of the banking system and the check-outting and all that. But I definitely think that this will put cost pressure on the payments system because it is cheaper. and allows all these competitors to come into the market, whether it's a Cracken, whether it's a Robin Hood, whether it's an X, you know, there are going to be a lot of super apps. Yes. You know, Mark Zuckerberg really started it with the Libra, if you remember that.

That was a stable coin, and Washington recoiled, and we've come a long way since then. And Coinbase is now launching their kind of super apt to try to be. Maybe we can show shares of Visa and MasterCard, which again, go back to the 2010s, like great duopoly, the plan I mean to use that word, but incredibly well-performing stocks. Now it's interesting because you look, they go, okay, they're kind of grinding, but the financial, traditional financial stocks have absolutely broken out this year and have done spectacularly. A lot of different reasons for that, but they don't seem scared about anything happening on the crypto front that's going to come in and take any of their business. It's going to be very hard, Kelly, it'll be several quarters before it'll impact earnings, either to the positive or to the negative, but stocks are kind of moving in anticipation of that, you know, kind of right now. And you see the incumbents, right?

Ethereum has had a great month. Circle, the one public stable coin companies had a great run since its IPO. So, you know, the market's getting ahead of it. But those are just the incumbents. The point that David made, there could be a lot of competitors coming into this space. So right now, I want to buy, let's say I wanted to buy the OIH, right? I think you've heard of that, the Panette oil and gas. I try to forget it, yes.

Yes, no. Well, investors have lately, but it was hot for a while. It was hot for a while. I put money, actual cash into, say, Schwab or Fidelity or TD Ameritrade, or whatever it is. I buy that. They transfer the cash over to you or your firm. They buy the equity. Is that going to happen, then, to Kelly's point, with stable coins?

I now can kind of replace the cash aspect of it with some kind of crypto holding. The gating factor now is you always have to touch first base, and the first base is your bank account. And you won't have to do that necessarily going forward. if you have digital dollars. So there'll be other ways of moving money. But listen, do that kill banks? I'm trying to figure out what this, to Kelly's point, you mentioned disintermediation of Visa and MasterCard.

I'm trying to understand why we need this. And if we do, what it's going to kill, because it's going to hurt something. It's having a minor impact. It will have a minor impact in our view on banks in the U.S., but lots of things already work pretty well in development. market. But in other countries, right, where the banking systems are less trustworthy, consumers are going to love an alternative. And you've already seen this over the last five years.

And that's why everyone's saying this helps the dollar because now all of these other, you know, investors or consumers are basically going to be happy to transact in something effective to a dollar that doesn't. But you don't think they're going to get in there and still try to take a cut? Oh, they are. They're going to want. But you know, Trump has moved so fast. This legislation has moved so fast. It's really kind of amazing, right? And it's bipartisan. So now companies that are looking to get into the space don't have to worry about the next administration changing the rules. It'll be so hard to change this legislation, especially since it's bipartisan. So spin us forward just a couple of years. It's five years from now. How much different does

the U.S. consumer, maybe institutional experience, look with the stock market or with, you know, walking into a coffee shop? I mean, is there a crazy? Is there a critical? crypto aspect to that, you think, that is materially different from what's going on right now? To be honest, I think it'll be minor. Things will be a little bit cheaper. Shopify and Uber companies that can leverage stable coins will have better margins. Will we notice that? Maybe not so much. I think what's going to be really dramatic is AI. That's what's going to change your shopping experience. And it's happening now. So I would say if you had to say AI and crypto, I'd say crypto kind of down here, digital dollar.

Again, a lot of it's going to be B2B, meaning business to business, the average consumer doesn't even need to worry about it. I would say that would even be a negative. If you had to have a wallet to move your stable coins around, all three of us would be no. I'd be out. No, thank you. And we tried messing with the wall.

Or a USB key that you're accidentally gets thrown out and you spend the next five years looking in a landfill for it. Exactly. What is like a 16-word password or something? Anyway. Yeah, it's like the war games thing. It's a 16-digit code. That is your key, but if you lose that, don't lose that.

Don't lose it. Don't lose it. You're in big trouble. Jan, thank you. I appreciate it. Again, early mover in the space, Jan Vanek. After the break, a rare interview with the power player in the power space, the CEO of SLB joins us live after this quick break.

Also on the menu, restaurant stocks reporting next week, and we'll talk more about how beef prices might impact them. And has Netflix set the bar too high? We're also awaiting President Trump signing the Genius Act into law. Much more coming up, and Power Lunch will be right there. Crypto Watch is sponsored by Crypto.com. Crypto.com is America's premier crypto platform. All right, welcome back to Power Lunch.

Some big energy-related earnings out this morning. SLB had a small profit drop. Net income did fall a bit year over year, primarily related to lower drilling activity in Saudi Arabia and some other locations. But SLB, formerly known as Schlumbergerge, also just wrapped a big deal for a company called Champion Let's talk about it all, joining us in an exclusive interview. And actually, his first TV interview of the year is SLB CEO Olivier Le Pouche.

Olivier, I thank you very much for coming on. How do we read these earnings? So thank you for having me. So earnings show resilience, resilience in our market, growth internationally, show margin expansion, and demonstrate the power of a brand. I think we're exposed to many markets. and despite the market volatility, despite the uncertainty, available to pull it through, grow slightly, internationally, particularly,

and then deliver further margin expansion. Very well set, Rosargonaut for the year. What I'm trying to understand is that you've got U.S. production, Olivier, at record high, the Permian going up. You've got OPEC nations advancing their production targets. Now, that's in August, but you know the pathway forward. It seems like there's more oil being drilled, in the world. So do you expect activity to pick back up?

I think the oil and gas for La Montola are in place and intact. I think if you look at the decision by OPEC plus release more supply to the market. I think it coincide with the summer big demands. It coincide with the stock refilling from China and the international global inventory being at a low level compared to historical benchmark. So the effect of these files, they have been added to the supply without having much impact on the present time with the community. So we remain, I would say, optimistic and confident that the residents of the oil market will stay in place.

Under those conditions, there will be some adjustment here and there, mostly on the short-cycle market possibly in North America, but the long duration and long cycle markets, be it the capacity expansion in Middle East or the long, very advantage. Deepwater asset will continue to see investment going forward. Closing up on the Champion X deal and without getting into the sort of the raw fundamentals

of what Champion X does, they're big in production and what's called recovery. Sort of again, like our previous stable coin conversation, Olivier, what is the recovery market. Why do the Champion X deal and what does the recovery aspect add to SLB's portfolio? It adds a portfolio of his recognises betting class first and foremost in this market. The customer put the priority of getting mobiles with existing assets by increasing their operating efficiency, increasing their capital efficiency at the same time having mobiles

with lower emissions. And I think the portfolio of Champalex adds very much complementary to our portfolio, a full solution of technology that the rest that needs for our customers. So this is a growing market. It's a market opportunity is quite exciting. It's a market that we can transform by adding integration, adding digital capability, and adding our subsurface, where the recovery makes a difference.

That's where we believe unlocking the recovery of the existing asset, adding more reserves, adding more miles, adding more production, sustained production over time is what the customer are looking for when they focus on their capital efficiency, operating efficiency for an existing asset. That's where the Champaignx portfolio has a lot and complements our portfolio very much,

both internationally and in North America, we are very strong. Olivierates Kelly here. And pretty much every time the president, hi, every time the president gets a chance, he talks about how thrilled he is about the relatively low oil price, the low gasoline price and so forth. Does that concern you in any way that

when the goal is to get prices down, I have to think it's a headwind in some way for your industry, even if there's more production and therefore utilization of your services? I think you have seen that the recent decline on some of the community price has been met with extremely good resilience on our market.

Yes, selectively, some customers in some basins in some countries have been adjusting their budget. But at the same time, I think the long-term fundamental are in place, the long-term deep-water assets, the long-term production recovery opportunity, the long-term digital and AI upside, that is a secular training industry, all present a context where the investment has to be steady and growing to meet the supply demand that I think the market is pulling. So I'm not very concerned, I'm optimistic, constructive for the resists.

of the market going forward and we show it. We are planning actually to grow LSD, low single digit in the second half when we are putting together the addition of Champagne and removing the effect of our diversity of Palliser and recently. So all of this, I think, prove that with our exposure, with our core performance through technology and integration and addition of digital,

I think we are well equipped to navigate positively in December. Well, we hope we don't have to wait another year or so to talk to you about those results. Olivier Le Push, I know in Europe, I know that it's getting late there on a Friday. We appreciate you coming on lives, particularly well-past dark in Europe. Olivier Le Push, thank you very much. Appreciate that. Thank you, Maya. Thank you, Kelly. Thank you. Take care.

I like hearing your French. Olivier Le Pouche. Le Pouche. Pepe Le Pueur. Before we go, a quick check on the NASDAQ approaching positive territory and reversing. early losses. Power Lunch is back with more in just a moment. Welcome back. We hit some record highs early in trading as investors digest corporate earnings pretty solid this week, economic data pretty good, shifting expectations about the path of rates as well as Waller reiterated his case for a July rate cut. Rates are still about steady in tight range. Rick Santelli is here with more

now. I'm glad they mentioned the Waller thing, Rick, because maybe it's just positioning for a possible appointment to the chair, but he's the only one really out there saying July right now, isn't he? Yeah, yeah, no, he is. And, you know, many people I deal with in the trading community think that there's a lot of kind of auditioning for the job going on. I'm not sure that's true or not true, but he definitely seems to be wanting to ease. And it seems though maybe Michelle Bauman is also a bit on the non-hawkish side, doveish side. But in the end, I wouldn't look for anything in the July meeting. I really like that chart, though, you had a 10s. There's something big going on in 10s. I'll have a surprise in a minute on that. But let's look at

a couple important charts. A year-to-date chart of December, this year, 25 Fed Fund Futures. And what really is important on this chart is if you look at the big humps in the middle in April, on the high side, the higher they go, the more easy than they're put in, it was just on April 8th. We're pricing in four quarter point cuts. As of right now, we have 1.8 quarter point cuts. So it'll just show you how the market has really started to respond to a lot of issues, not the least of which is the economy isn't doing all that bad. Now, let's look at twos and tens year-to-date on one chart. And I really like this one. First of all, notice that both of these yields are lower on the year. We settle at 424 in a two year,

and it's, what, at 386, which, by the way, is unchanged on the week. Let's look at the 10 there, right? It's at 457. When we closed last year, it's lower on the year. And look at the high and low on that chart. Here's the surprise. As an ex-technician trader, this is key. The high yield close is 480, the low-yield close 4%. Which means the middle ground there is 440. Basically exactly where we're trading. Traders call that it's at an equilibrium. Midpoint in such a large range means the market's comfortable here. That's important. And finally, a one-year chart of the 2's 10 spread. Just keep in mind. how much it's moved. You know, we're at 56 basis points. That's really interesting, considering we started at what, 20, right around 20, but here's

the key. There's a lot of steepening room left, Kelly. This chart goes back to March of 2021. In March of 2021, 210 spread was 158 basis points. So when many say, what's the big trade? I said last year, the trade you want is a steepening trade. I still believe that there could be a lot of room. Back to Brian.

Rick Santelli, you have yourself a great weekend, sir. Appreciate it. Thank you. All right, folks, just a reminder, we are waiting for President Trump to sign Washington's crypto bill into law. We're going to bring that to you live when it happens. And, of course, any other comments the president might make about tariffs or, I mean, that Epstein guy? Who knows? And by the way, the NASDAQ, which was down pretty good earlier in the session, has just turned. positive, an hour and a half left to go in trading. NASDAQ comp is up one-hundredth of 1%.

But it's in the green nonetheless, and we are back right after this. Welcome back. We're awaiting President Trump's signature on a major piece of legislation with big implications for the future of digital currencies. Emily Wilkins is at the White House. Any second now, Emily, yeah? Any second, Kelly. And you know it was a roller coaster of a week,

but we finally got here to this bill signing, really a major moment for the crypto companies. This is the first bill that's really going to provide a sense of structure and rules of the road for stablecoin. You know, I spoke earlier this week with Kara Calvert of Coinbase. She said that the bill is going to help international companies move funds across borders or any company that wants to move assets more quickly can do so once they have some more guarantees on stable coin. But really, this is just the start for the crypto industry. Now that they have a regulatory framework for stable coins,

want to expand that market for into market structure for all digital assets. And remember, another bill that the House passed yesterday, it does exactly that. Breaks down when crypto is considered a commodity versus a security. That bill now goes to the Senate, which plans to come out with their own proposal on market structure before the end of the month. One of the lawmakers who is working on that bill, Senator Cynthia Lummis, told me this week that she will be working closely with members in the House to try to find something that can pass both chambers.

But she also said that that first step to advance the bill likely isn't going to happen until the end of September. So crypto industry is celebrating a win today, but still really more to come for them to get what they actually want, which is a market structure bill that can encompass all digital assets. Kelly? All right. Emily, when we hear from the president, of course, we'll head back over to the White House. For now, we appreciate it. Emily Wilkins.

In the meantime, let's get now to Bertha Coombs with a CNBC news update. Bertha. Hey, Brian. The Education Department announced today that, it will release some previously frozen grant funds for after-school programs. The reversal comes nearly three weeks after the Trump administration decided to withhold more than $6 billion in federal grants for the programs, as well as adult literacy and English language instruction. Israeli defense minister Israel Katz is at the Pentagon right now for a meeting with his U.S. counterpart Pete Hegeseth.

Both men insisted before their meeting that all Iranian nuclear facilities, facilities were completely obliterated in strikes last month on the country. It comes a day after NBC News reported an assessment showed the strikes only destroyed one of three sites. And the Rosebud sled from Citizen Kane sold at auction this week for a staggering $14.75 million. Heritage Auctions said the sled is one of the most expensive pieces. of memorabilia sold. Indiana Jones's iconic bullwhip from The Last Crusade

also sold for $525,000. Brian, I think the most expensive for probably the ruby red slippers from the Wizard of Oz. Yeah, those went for a couple million, didn't they or something like that? I think so. I think so. I don't know if they're still

out there for auction, but... What about the bike with the dog in the basket? What did that go for? Bertha, thank you very much. All right, I'll get you. All right, on deck why some restaurant investors may be having a growing beef with a real inflationary problem. Welcome back as second quarter earnings season March is on next week. We'll get a better read on the health of the consumer with Domino's and Chipotle set to report.

Domino's actually up double digits this year and is one of the best performing restaurant stocks. Chipotle facing some pressure, although it did get an upgrade today at BMO. If you look at the individual stocks across the restaurant space, most are actually in the green this year. But the restaurant index in the S&P is still underperforming the overall market. And as we pointed out yesterday, rising beef prices could create another problem down the line. Let's bring in Kate Rogers to discuss. Kate, I think with Chipotle, too, the Brian Halo is gone. I don't know if Starbucks, I don't know if they got it over at Starbucks, but it's a little bit gone from Chipotle now.

So it's so interesting you mentioned those two names, Kelly, Chipotle and Starbucks. They've long had pricing power. And that's one of the things we're going to be really watching for this quarter. Which brands have it and which brands don't. What's been interesting to kind of watch in the first six months of the year, you're seeing a lot of these fast food names and fast casual names kind of struggle more. And the casual dining names have been performing better. One reason could be that people perceive you're getting more for your money, more bang for your buck, and more of a sit-down dining experience, which is what some of those like a Darden with parent company, rather, of Olive Garden, could be offering to a consumer. So that's going to be one area of focus, of course.

And then the other one is just going to be performance of the low-income consumer. That's something that we've heard a lot of challenges and focus on from brands like McDonald's, again, across the fast food space. But they've got the intro of the snack wrap. That's a good example of something that could cater to a lower-income demographic. And we'll see how it performs and get more updates soon. But overall, how do you think they'd characterize business? We had the consumer confidence massive shock earlier this year, which now with the numbers this morning is kind of slowly giving way to something more positive. There's no getting around that dining out is still more expensive than cooking at home and grocery shopping.

Both have costs, but it's all about where consumers want to spend their money. And again, some of those more premium brands, you mentioned stock performances for the year. Other names that come to mind here outside of the Chipotle's and the Starbucks of the world would be Kava and Sweet Green. Those names were doing really, really well last year, right? Because they were a little bit more expensive, a bit more of a premium offering, but people were willing to pay for it. Now you're seeing investors kind of pulling away from some of those names. names as consumers get more price sensitive. Let's all wildly speculate here.

Why not? It's Friday. Kate, you ready to do that? Because I'm looking at my facts at screen. Over the past three months, Trivina, I deal with the best performing restaurant stock is. It's up 127 percent. I did not until I just looked. It's Red Robin Gourmet Burger. Now, all we've done is talk about the price of beef at record highs. And here's a company literally with beef burger in its name, and it's soaring.

Kate, is that because are consumers just kind of brushing these prices aside, or are they not seeing the higher prices because the restaurants are, for lack of a better term, eating it? I think it really, it's the haves and the have-nots right now, Brian. So the consumers that are willing to spend money at certain chains, you can see investors putting their money behind some of those chains. But again, to bring it kind of back to some of the key names that we're always watching here, particularly in downturns, like a McDonald's, that's always done really well during recessions. They've been struggling to bring that consumer in.

And as you mentioned, those beef and cattle prices up, I believe, over 12 percent year on year. That's going to be something that these restaurants have to contend with in the back half of the year, right? If their costs are going up, do they pass them onto the consumer? Can they pass them onto the consumer in this environment? Starbucks is another name that has said it's not raising prices for the rest of its fiscal 2025. but they may have to think about it next year if input costs continue to go up. So we're going to be watching all of that this quarter. And again, kicks off on Monday with Domino's, one of the best performers of the year,

along with Papa John's and Wingstop. All of those names were pandemic darlings, kind of struggled, and now they're doing really well again this year. Red Robin. You ever been? I've never been. Do you say Red Robin? I've been many, many years ago.

It's been a long time. I think it's a, yeah, because you're on the West Coast now, Kate. I think you're not going to In-N-Out Burger, if they have those in the Bay Area, I know they're big in L.A. And that are, I've never been to a Red Robin. And this weekend, maybe I'll go. Let's. Maybe you go to Red Robin. One more quick thing, guys, as we're just talking about these restaurants and the West Coast.

Another item to watch, of course, will be any commentary around immigration and tariffs. So we saw last month, Jack in the Box, which is heavily concentrated out here on the West Coast, did get a downgrade over concerns. from Stiefel over immigration policies and aggressive immigration policies, not only on workforces, but prevalence within Hispanic communities and potential chilling effect on people going out and spending money. That was the first time I had seen a note like that in this sector. So we'll definitely be watching to see if there is any more update or commentary, not only from analysts on Wall Street, but also from the companies themselves.

Yeah, serious note there. Kate Rogers. Thank you very much. All right, so we're going to go from burgers to, I guess. I guess sitting at home and eating a burger. Netflix beating earnings. Shares of Netflix, though, they are down about 5% today. Some people suggesting maybe Netflix a victim of its own success. Julia Borsden is here now. What does that mean, Julia? People have gotten so used to Netflix just blowing all the estimates away that merely really good is not good enough?

Just beating expectations on earnings and raising revenue guidance considered a disappointment for this. which had already seen such a massive run up about 40% year to date, up over 80% over the past 12 months. So I think, Brian, the expectations were just very high. And there were a couple of elements that analysts are really digging into. Some question about engagement. The company has said engagement is stable, but analysts and investors would like to see increasing engagement. Then also the fact that margins, operating margins, the company says, will decline in the second half of the year, because they have these additional costs around the huge slate of content that they're going to be launching in addition to the additional marketing costs that come along with that.

So they say margins will be declining, though it is worth noting that the margins are still ahead of expectations. Yeah, waiting on, I guess, we're going to jump to Trump. Okay, Julie, I was going to ask a follow-up, but I got the hook in the ear. President Trump signing the so-called genius bill. Let's listen in. They named it after me, and I want to thank you. This is an overnight. You know, I did something very unusual. I said, this has been something.

It's been a lot of people thought it was impossible. Some of the things that have been done. And, of course, the great big, I added the word great, the great big, beautiful bill, that was something that nobody thought possible. They thought it would be in anywhere from seven to maybe three. I'll go the opposite direction, but three to seven different bills.

and we said, let's just put it in one, because this way there's something for everyone, and there really is, there's a lot of things for everyone. And when we get the word out, how great that is for every single person in this country virtually, and all they have is a sound by death. You know what they're sound by is death. Aren't they nice, death?

They are the most incompetent people. They've lost their confidence. They've lost everything, if you think about it. But Jasmine Crockett is on her way. She's on her way. She's the new star of the Democrat Party, Jasmine Carcett. They're in big trouble, but I have to tell you that was great and this was great. And I am so tired of making phone calls at 2, 3, 4 o'clock in the morning,

getting calls from our great speaker. Sir, we have 12 hard nose. I say, Mike, it's 2 o'clock in the morning. We have 12 hard nose. The good news is I'd call up. Hello, Jim. How are you? Sir, you have my vote. Sir, you have my vote. I really just, they just want a little love. Unfortunately, it's always the same. It's always the same 12 people.

It's five senators and it's 12 congressmen. And I actually said to John Thune and I said to Mike, I said, listen, I want to have a party. But not to those people that I have to speak to. endlessly every time. And they're wonderful because they always seem to come through other than a couple. Rand Paul Jr. from the Congress and Rand Paul from, other than a few people. But I said, I want to have them over. We're going to have a party for everybody in Congress, everyone in Congress, except 12. We're going to have, and Mike is down. I'll tell you what, Tom is definitely coming. The whole group, where are those 12 people? They're the only people I don't see. We can.

We could do it today. We don't have to vote. And I would say of the 53 senators, 48, we're going to have 48 in here. You won't even have to come to that one. But these are the greatest people because they always vote yes and we don't have to go crazy. You trust us. We trust you. And it's been a very special group of people. We really do. I mean, 96% phenomenal and 4% extremely difficult. Do you agree with that? But they get there, most of them, not all of them. Those are the ones who really don't like. But I want to thank you all for being here. This is really a big day. This afternoon, we take a giant step to cement the American dominance of global finance and crypto technology as we signed the Landmark Genius Act into law. So congratulations to everybody.

It is a big deal. You've come a long way since the Biden administration when they had no idea. idea what you were all talking about, and half of you were under arrest for no reason whatsoever. True. For no reason. And we want to have it, not China. China wasn't actually happy. They were watching this. They like it. And we've got this. We've got AI. We've got a lot of great ones happening. And this is a very big thing. And I want to thank the Bill's author, Senator Bill Haggerty, a very good friend of mine. Thank you, Bill.

Thank you, John. He's a great guy. He's a great guy. He's a very handsome guy. He looks great. He's got the whole package. But, you know, I got to know him. He was ambassador to Japan.

And we had a little problem with Japan on trade. But he was my ambassador to Japan. And I went to Japan, and he is speaking fluently Japanese. I said, did you learn it as a child? No, no. I just learned it over the last four or five months. I said, you learned Japanese. maybe the single hardest language to learn.

It's actually breathing, rather than... It's breathing. I'm not going to imitate it because we'll end up with a big story, and I don't want that. But he spoke totally fluent Japanese. I said, that's very impressive. And he was introducing me to Mr. Honda.

I said, oh, are you in the car business? He goes, yes. I said, you're a very rich man. And then he said, Mr. Toyota, right? Toyota. And I said, what business are you in? Let me guess. He said, cars.

He was my interpreter, and I was so impressed. And I was getting ready to leave. He said, sir, I'd like to run for the United States Senate. I said, where are you from? He said, Tennessee. I said, well, I love Tennessee, but do they know you there? No, but if you endorse me, I'll win, right? And I endorsed him, and he took a 48-point lead.

And they didn't know who the hell he was. And he's turned out to be a great senator. And now they all know who you are. So you are. You're fantastic. And we thank you. And just the fact that you're doing this and you understand this is a complicated world. And you understand it, Bill.

So you've been great. Thank you very much. We're also pleased to be joined by our great vice president, J.D. Vance. J.D., thank you very much. Good job. And he's been up speaking late at night on the phone. I say, J.D., how about you take it three or four? these people, please. Because three or four, I cannot speak to. I just can't. And he'd take

him and he'd come through, right, J.D.? Also, Speaker Mike Johnson. He is unbelievable. He's an unbelievable. I mean, if you go by what we're doing, if you keep at this pace, you can't keep it up for another 200 days. But I will tell you this, if you keep up the pace for another week, you go down as the greatest speaker in the House in history. So one more way. One more way. Who needs Tip O'Neill? Who needs Tip O'Neill?

He's better looking than Tip O'Neill, too. But, no, he's been going at a fervent pace. Would you say that's right? Your wife probably says, you are crazy. You've been aging beautifully at front. He's an amazing, actually, he's an amazing speaker, a great leader, and everybody likes him and respects him. And that's why we're with a very small majority,

like three. We had a time when we were one. Remember? We said we're one heart attack away from losing the house. Then we won a couple of seats and a couple of other. Now we have seven, maybe. Maybe if we're lucky, seven. But we win with, nobody's ever done. I don't think anyone's ever done this before. To win with those small. We had a little help from Tom too, right? And a lot of other people. I want to introduce also Secretary Howard Lutnik who's been fantastic. You have done a great job, Howard. We've got trade deals coming out of our ears, right? We had so many trade deals.

They're all calling so many, and I really mean this too. It's like, you know, how do you deal with so many? But, you know, I always say when we send out the paper, that was a deal. They don't want to the fake news, doesn't want to hear that. When I send out the paper that you're paying 35 or 40 percent tariff, that's a deal. Then they'll call and see if they can make a little bit different kind of a deal, like opening up their country to trade. In some cases, they've never been open. But we're doing well, and we have a couple of big ones to announce pretty soon, right?

You could almost do it today. Maybe we'll say it. Maybe later on we'll do it. Senator Bernie Marino, a great victory. Bernie had great victory. A great victory. That was one of the truly tough races. A lot of people weren't sure anybody could win that series.

and you want it in easy fashion, right? We want it together when you think of it. But you wanted an easy fashion. You did a great job. Great guy. House Majority Whip, this is a great leader, Tom, Amber, a great politician and leader. Really good.

And I like his wife even better. His wife is, she's the boss, but you are married to a fantastic woman, huh? And he knows that. And he likes to. hearing it. Some people don't, you know. They say, sir, could you please stop saying that my wife is better than me, sir? Those are the guys that don't usually end up with a good marriage, you know? He's got a great marriage. So, thank you, Tom. You really are a fantastic leader and representative.

And representatives, Troy Downing, French Hill, where's French Hill? Where's French Hill? You have been so great. Thank you, French. I spoke to him a little late. He was walking down the hall, I'm saying French. He said, I'm there, sir. You are a great, great, great guy. Everyone respects your French. You know that. Bill Heisinger, Bill, thank you very much. Thank you very much. Good job. Dan Muser, I thought he was going to become the next governor of Pennsylvania, but he likes Congress better, I guess, huh? So, but I think you're terrific and, you know, I would have always been behind you, that I can tell you. Tim Moore.

Tim? Thank you, Tim. John Rose, John. Hi, John. Thanks. Good job. Brian Stile. Brian, style. Still young. Still young. Still nice and young. That's good. G.T. Thompson. Thank you. Andy Barr, good friend of all of ours. Thank you, Andy. Monica D. La Cruz. Monica. She's here someplace. Thank you, Monica. Thank you, Monica. Mike Harrodopoulos, Mike. Thank you, Mike. Look good. Mike Lawler, Mr. Salt. Well, it should guarantee your district.

I mean, you worked hard for New York, right? And you're on television, I'm on television, so this should be good for a couple of points. But without you and your couple of friends from New York, that wouldn't have happened. That was not easy, right? Congratulations. Great job.

Anna Paulina Luna, Anna, who is so great. I don't, even if she's here or not here, I want to tell you that she has been so great and worked so hard to make sure we got it approved. Ralph Norman, Ralph? Ralph? Ralph, what happened to Ralph? Nick Begich. Nick?

Thank you, Nick. Good job. Good job. Good votes. I just saw a great poll on you, huh? Very good. Congratulations, Nick. Andy Ogles, Andy, who's a terrific friend, Beth Van Dine.

Beth. Thank you, Beth. Great job. Thank you. Thank you very much for the great support. Roger Williams, a great baseball player who also had to take a bullet, unfortunately. But he is a great guy. He was involved in that whole catastrophe, but he's fantastic and has been from day one,

along with a lot of other people that I won't call out because I have no idea where the hell you are. I think I saw Jason here somewhere. Where was Jason? Oh, it's lucky I called him. Ooh, it's lucky. They didn't put your name because I invited you at the last moment, right? He was over there doing some business in the White House, but you've been incredible in your position.

Nobody knows more about taxes and financing you do, so we appreciate it, right? Is that true, Howard? It's true. Thanks, Jason. Great job. And you'll help out with that other matter. You make him so strong and powerful, right? along with Deputy Secretary of Treasury, Michael Falkender.

Where's Michael? Good, Michael. How are you? Good. You'll help out over there, okay? And Ambassador Ken Howrie. Ambassador. Thank you, Ken.

Great job, Ken. I also want to recognize some of the countless industry leaders here today, including Brian Armstrong of Coinbase. We've done a good job, Brian. That's a big deal. Dave Ripley of Cracken. Thank you, Dave. Jeremy Aller of Circle.

This is a big day. Good job. Good job, Jeremy. Paolo Ardino of Tether. Palo. Paolo, thank you, Paolo. Ryan McEnnerney of Visa. That's a good company.

Thank you. Chris Pavlovsky of Rumble, Griff, Chris. What happened to your location, Chris? You're always a front row guy. You're just being nice today, I think. How's Rumble doing? Good?

Good. If Rumble's doing good, that means truth is doing good. Truth. That's great. You're doing a great job. Thank you, Chris, very much. Vlad 10F of Robin Hood. Vlad, thank you, Rad.

Thank you, Vlad. Thank you, Vlad. Good. Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss. These are two smart, handsome guys. They got the whole package. They're of Gemini, but they have the whole package. There are a lot of things, actually, but Gemini is just the one for today, right? They've got the look. They've got the genius. Got plenty of cash. And it's great that you're on our side. You guys are great. I can never tell them apart. But their mother can. I ask, can your mother tell you apart? And the answer is yes, right? Easily, or is it tough for her?

Easy, I figure. You guys have been great. Thank you very much. Great to be with you. Let me say the entire crypto community, for years, you were mocked and dismissed and counted out. You were counted out as little as a year and a half ago. But this signing is a massive validation.

And even before this signing, over the last year, year and a half, I think your stuff has gone up more than any stock or just about more, a couple of stocks that were pretty good, I will say. But you have certainly as an industry gone up more than anybody. Nobody's gained the respect in such a short period of time. But this signing is a massive validation of your hard work and your pioneering spirit and your ability to never give up, because a lot of people would have given up two, three years ago. So I want to thank you for contributing to the incredible strength of America.

This is going to make it stronger. And congratulations on this. incredible achievement. You've made our dollar look really good and strong and powerful. It's good for the dollar and it's good for the country. And that's why I backed you at an early stage. And I also did it for the votes because you did come out and vote. I will have. And they changed tune, you know, Biden's team, they changed tune right in the middle of the campaign. All of a sudden, they loved you guys. They dropped all charges. They did have I got you guys out of so much trouble. And you know what? I don't think anybody voted for them, right? Because

You remember. You remember. They treated you very unfairly, actually. So it's a great honor that we were involved. And it was. It was a tremendous amount of support that we got at the polls. We won, think of it, we won every swing state. We won by millions of votes.

We won the popular vote. We won the districts by 2,750. Think of that to 505. Different districts, too, by the way. Every once in a lot of that number can change, It doesn't change by much. The map was almost totally red, and you guys were with us right from the beginning. Exactly one year ago this month, many of you were with me in Nashville, Tennessee.

Do you remember that day, right? That was a big day, Nashville, Tennessee. When we became, and I became the first presidential candidate ever to address the Bitcoin conference, and at this time, and at that time, crypto builders and founders were under relentless this assault by the Biden administration, which was trying to crush your industry and crush you as people and go after your families. And they were a vicious group of people. You know, people don't realize that they were vicious, incompetent but vicious.

Well, Joe was an incompetent guy, but he was always known as a vicious guy. I guess if you're going to be in that, you're probably off, if they're incompetent is better, right? Because you don't want to have a vicious guy that's competent. If you did, I wouldn't be standing here today, right? But I pledged that we would bring back American liberty and leadership and make the United States the crypto capital of the world, and that's what we've done. And under the Trump administration, this is only going further. You're going to do really well.

I mean, I'm so proud of what you've done in the last couple of years. And very important, on day one, I remember I did this, and I said this, and I mentioned this name, and I got the greatest applause of the whole campaign. We fired Joe Biden's SEC chair, Gary. Gensler. We fired him. But I remember I was making a speech and, you know, it was just a line in speech. Then I said, and I will fire Gary Gensler. The place exploded. I said, I finished like one and I said, what the hell did that guy do? There was a lot of hatred there, I'll tell you. And it turned out, as I got familiar with everything, it turned out, you were absolutely right. In his place, I appointed

a visionary chairman who wants America to build the future. and not block the future. He's going to be unbelievable. He'll go down as one of the greats. And Paul Atkins, where are you, Paul Atkins? And you know, Paul, the crypto guys, they said, everybody said, not only crypto, every in this, they all wanted Paul for the position.

And he's a tough cookie, too. He's just, but they actually said, we don't care. We just think he's fair. All they wanted was fairness. And they have somebody that you're really a champion of the street and you're a champion of the country, you're going to do a fantastic job. I saw you interviewed the other night.

I watched it about 2 o'clock in the morning. There was a little thing called C-SPAN, which I don't know how many people were watching. Don't worry, you were on prime time, too, but they happen to have a little rerun. I don't want to embarrass you. But a fantastic job, really. You are absolutely so perfect for the job.

Congratulations, Paul. And Paul is here today among the commissioners, various commissioners, including Hester Pierce and Mark, Yoida, Hester, and Mark Yowita. Thank you, Hester. Thank you very much, and thank you, Mark. Wherever you may be. Is Mark here?

Oh, stand up, Mark. I didn't... Good. Thank you. Good job. Good. I'm glad I gave you a second crack you didn't hear because of the thunderous applause for Hester. But thank you. I heard tremendous things about both of you. Thank you very much. My first week in office, I also established the first ever presidential working group on digital assets.

And we have an executive director, Whizbo Hines. Bow Hines. Right, Bo. And Bo is a great football player, right? Bo is a great football player, one of the better players in college football. So I know you from that also. See, who would think that I know that? I know a lot of things, Bo.

But he was a champion player. I stopped the weaponization of government against crypto and Bitcoin, and we ended the lawless operation choke point 2.0. That was a bad operation. And I kept my promises to the community and granted a full presidential pardon to Ross Albrecht. Ross Albrecht.

And you have no idea how important that name became. It was like a symbol, and his mother was unbelievable. His mother was an unbelievable woman. But it was so important to a certain group of people. And in the truly momentous act last month, I signed an executive order establishing the U.S. Strategic Bitcoin Reserve, as well as the United States digital asset stockpile. And that's all signed up. And with today's signing, we're pushing even further into the exciting new frontier. Just as I promised last year, the Genius Act creates a clear and simple regulatory framework to establish and unleash the immense promise of dollar-backed stable coins.

This could be perhaps the greatest revolution in financial technology since the birth of the Internet itself. A lot of people are saying that. I don't know. What do you guys think? Yes? If you say yes, I'm saying yes. I think it's great that you're involved, I will tell you. Many Americans are unaware that behind the scenes, the technical backbone of the financial system is decades out of date.

Many, many years out of date. You know that. and others are straightening it out, but payments and money transfers are costly and take days or even weeks to clear. Under this bill, the entire ancient system will be eligible for a 21st century upgrade using the state-of-the-art crypto technology. Who would have thought we would have been saying that two years after I really met you for the first time?

The Genius Act provides banks, businesses, and financial institutions a framework for issuing crypto assets backed one for one with real U.S. dollars, treasury bills, and other cash equivalence. It's really strengthening the dollar and giving the dollar great prominence. And, you know, you have this little group called Bricks. It's fading out fast. But Bricks is, they wanted to try and take over the dollar, the dominance of the dollar and the standard of the dollar. And I said, anybody that's in the Bricks Consortium of Nations, we're going to tear a few,

10%, and they had a meeting the following day, and almost nobody showed up. They said, leave me alone. We didn't want to, they didn't want to be tariffed there, or not. That's amazing. No, we're not going to let the dollar slide. If we have a smart president, you're never going to let the dollar slide. If you have a dummy, that could happen, like the last one. He would, if you ever asked him about the dollar slider, he would have no idea, but we can't

let that ever happen again. Consumers, vendors, and people all over the world will then be able to use. those stable coins for ultra-low-cost transactions that are cleared and settled in a matter of seconds rather than weeks and months. And it's really an amazing thing. And with the privacy, flexibility, and decentralization of cash, this revolution has the potential to supercharge American economic growth and empower billions of people to save and transfer in U.S. dollars. It's really all backed by the dollars. It's really a great thing. And a lot of You know, we had a lot of Democrat support, I have to tell you that.

I was shocked any time you get one, but we had a tremendous amount of Democrat support, which we appreciate it, which just shows you that you're doing the right thing. This will increase demand for U.S. Treasury's lower interest rates and secure the dollar's status as the world's reserve currency for generations to come. The reserve currency is so important. You know, if we lost that, that would be like losing a world war. We can never let anyone play games with us, and that's why when I heard about this group from Bricks, six countries, basically, I hit them very, very hard. And if they have a form, if they have a really form in a meaningful way, it will end very quickly,

I will tell you for them. They won't be gone very long. I don't think they'll even do it. They're virtually afraid to meet. I also remain fully committed to my pledge never to allow the creation of a central bank digital currency in America. It won't happen. My first. Thank you.

And the other night, I will say with some of the Congress, men and women, they wanted that so badly. That was so important to them. You know, I was impressed that they knew what the hell it was, to be honest with you. Please, sir, please, the central bank digital currency, you have to make sure. And I'm saying, what do you know about that? that. It's amazing the knowledge that people have gained all of a sudden. We had a lot of problems with some of them. I said, we've already got it from the Fed, right? From commerce and from an executive order. You don't need it a fourth time. Sure, we have to get it. It's amazing.

But they knew their subject. That didn't they? And we helped them out. My first week in office, I signed an executive order to ban the creation of a CB, DC. in the United States, and very soon I look forward to signing legislation that will codify and ban the, make it a permanent law, put it in permanence. I'm also committed to signing landmark crypto market structure legislation this year to grow the industry. We're going to be growing it even more, more than people ever thought. It's a really hot industry. And for a little while, two nights ago, we were a little concerned, because we were a little short on votes

Like, I would say maybe we were about nine short. Nine short at three in the morning. We were about four short at 3.30 in the morning. And we were in good shape at 4 o'clock in the morning, right? But the people, and few people have fought harder for the bill than we're signing than some of the people here today. You have been unbelievable. It's our White House AI and CryptoZar, David, Sacks, who has done such a great job.

And I did his, he has a show now, I've become a showman, but a couple of years ago, right? It's probably two years ago now in San Francisco, and I did his show, and I heard he's a very smart guy, and we had a great show, you kept it going a lot longer, and you got, is that still your highest rated ever show? Oh, he knows what to say. He knows what, he had a rating that he had millions and millions of people. He said, what's going on? But we had a great show.

And I said, you know, that guy's really smart. I said, if I get elected, he's running at that time. If I get elected, we're going to bring him into government in some ways. He's worth a fortune. He's made a lot of money. He's a very rich, he's a very rich billionaire. But this is more important, doesn't it? This is me too.

It's like, doesn't matter. This is much, I know Howard and I talk about it all the time. Howard could go back to his wonderful brokerage firm, hire one or two people. And it's not the same as, you know, It's not the same as what you're doing, right? The biggest, we're doing the biggest deals in the world. Actually, the deal we're doing now in tariffs is the biggest, when you edit up, the biggest deal ever made in history. It could be 1,000 IBMs.

I mean, if you think of it, it's the biggest deal ever done. So it's hard to go back to a brokerage firm and, you know, make $79,000 commission on the stale of a sock, right? That's true. But I want to ask David. So David's been fantastic. He's done an incredible job. And I'd like to ask David, come up, say a few words. Thank you very much.

All right. Thank you, President Trump. It's a great honor to be here. And it's true that I'd never expected to work in government at all. And then everything changed after President Trump came on my podcast. And I, you know, I accepted this job as Cryptozoar because I thought it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to work for a president who really wants to get things done for the American people. And if anything, that's been an understatement.

The first six months of this administration have been more successful than any administration in American history. What's been done? It's just been incredible. President Trump has work at tech speed. We're used to working fast in Silicon Valley, but even this is fast for us in Silicon Valley,

the speed at which you move, President Trump. It's really incredible. And now today you have another historic legislative achievement that is a monumental step to fulfilling your promise to making the United States a crypto capital of the world. This genius act, will unlock American dominance in the crypto industry by creating clear rules of the road.

It will update archaic payment rails with a revolutionary new payment system. And it will extend US dollar dominance, like you said, globally, by creating a digital dollar that people all over the world can use. And for every digital dollar in a crypto wallet, there'll be a traditional dollar in a US bank account, which will create trillions of dollars of demand for US Treasury.

So that is the power of this bill as US dollar dominance. This is a huge promise made and promise kept by President Trump. And there's just a few other people I'd like to thank. First, my family for being here. Thank you. And Bo Hines, who President Trump mentions the director of our crypto council. He really did the heavy lifting here.

So, Bo, I just want to thank you again. And my chief of staff, Tracy Johnson as well, who also does the heavy lifting. And Bill Hagerty and French Hill and all the congressmen and senators who have already been mentioned by President Trump, so I'll save the time. But it's really been an honor to work with all of you. This was really a team effort. But most of all, I want to thank President Trump. for accomplishing what nobody thought was possible.

And it's true that just earlier this week, the media was reporting that this bill was dead. This bill was dead. And then the media didn't know one thing, that we had a secret weapon. We have a dealmaker in chief. And thanks to President Trump, he stepped in and saved this bill. And it's because of your vision, your leadership,

your determination, your skill that we're all here today. So thank you very much, President Trump. Is that Laura? Please come. Yes, come here. This is our superstar. She was the head of the Republican Party, and nobody complained about anything.

We went on to great. This is Laura Trump, married to a young gentleman named Eric. They have beautiful two children, but she has been so good. She stepped into that position like it was nothing that we won, and she said, Dad, I'd like to go home right now to my beautiful husband and my son and daughter, right?

But you did a fantastic job, and you worked with a great gentleman, too, He's doing a fantastic job. But I just want to thank you. I just saw you standing back there. I wanted to bring her in. Thank you very much, Laura. Thank you.

So under the Trump administration, I just got back from Saudi Arabia, and we went to Qatar. We went to a number of countries. And I will tell you, the level of respect that this country has now is incredible. The UAE, I tell you what, we had a time there. But every leader said the same thing.